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Rancher vs containerd: What are the differences?
Introduction
In this article, we will discuss the key differences between Rancher and containerd, two popular technologies used in the containerization ecosystem.
Integration with Container Orchestration Platforms: Rancher is a complete container management platform that provides features for managing and orchestrating containers using various orchestration platforms like Kubernetes, Docker Swarm, and Mesos. On the other hand, containerd is a low-level container runtime that focuses on container execution and management only, leaving orchestration responsibilities to higher-level tools like Kubernetes.
Performance and Efficiency: Rancher, being a comprehensive container management platform, comes with additional features and modules that may introduce some overhead compared to containerd, which is a lightweight container runtime. Containerd is designed to be minimalistic and highly efficient, allowing for faster container operations and reduced resource consumption.
Ease of Use and Learning Curve: Rancher provides a user-friendly web interface and CLI tools that make it relatively easier to set up, manage, and monitor containerized applications. On the other hand, containerd is primarily used as a building block for container platforms and requires more technical expertise and familiarity with container concepts to utilize effectively.
Ecosystem Integration: Rancher provides a range of built-in integrations and features like a catalog of pre-configured application templates, load balancers, storage options, and networking solutions, making it easier to integrate containers into a broader infrastructure. Containerd, being a lower-level runtime, focuses on container management at the core level and typically relies on external tools for additional functionalities.
Scalability and High Availability: Rancher offers advanced capabilities for managing large-scale deployments and ensuring high availability through clustering, load balancing, and failover mechanisms. On the other hand, containerd does not provide native clustering or high availability features, as it is primarily concerned with container runtime operations.
Community and Support: Both Rancher and containerd have active and growing communities around them, providing support, documentation, and resources to users. However, Rancher, being a more comprehensive platform, may have a larger community and a wider range of resources available.
In summary, Rancher is a comprehensive container management platform with richer features and orchestration capabilities, while containerd is a lightweight container runtime focused on efficient container execution. Rancher offers a user-friendly interface, built-in integrations, scalability, and support, whereas containerd provides better performance, simplicity, and flexibility for integrating with higher-level orchestration platforms.
Pros of containerd
- No Need for docker shim3
- Supports Kubernetes version greater than 1.212
- Needs docker shim to work on kubernetes0
- No kubernetes support after 1.220
Pros of Rancher
- Easy to use103
- Open source and totally free79
- Multi-host docker-compose support63
- Load balancing and health check included58
- Simple58
- Rolling upgrades, green/blue upgrades feature44
- Dns and service discovery out-of-the-box42
- Only requires docker37
- Multitenant and permission management34
- Easy to use and feature rich29
- Cross cloud compatible11
- Does everything needed for a docker infrastructure11
- Simple and powerful8
- Next-gen platform8
- Very Docker-friendly7
- Support Kubernetes and Swarm6
- Application catalogs with stack templates (wizards)6
- Supports Apache Mesos, Docker Swarm, and Kubernetes6
- Rolling and blue/green upgrades deployments6
- High Availability service: keeps your app up 24/76
- Easy to use service catalog5
- Very intuitive UI4
- IaaS-vendor independent, supports hybrid/multi-cloud4
- Awesome support4
- Scalable3
- Requires less infrastructure requirements2
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Cons of containerd
Cons of Rancher
- Hosting Rancher can be complicated10